Respect the Bird

A national survey from Allrecipes found 82% of Americans think Christmas is marketed too early. Moreover, 42% admit being frustrated by Christmas shopping sales that begin before Thanksgiving while 39% just try to ignore them.

To commit myself to fully enjoying the Thanksgiving holiday, I recently took a pledge to Respect the Bird. The mission of this grassroots movement is to “restore Thanksgiving to its rightful place as a meaningful, respected American holiday, not one that’s merely a one-day delicious afterthought between Halloween and Christmas.” Obviously, I was on board immediately.

As part of the pledge to Respect the Bird, I promise to savor the true meaning of Thanksgiving and not begin shopping for the December holidays until after November 24th. It’s that simple. Of course, there aren’t many retailers that feel the same way, but kudos to those, like Nordstrom, who do!

Breakfast

This morning’s breakfast was a toasted whole wheat Bagel Thin with peanut butter and banana slices on top. I also drank a glass of iced coffee with coconut milk and a splash of vanilla-flavored creamer.

Workout

As I mentioned in my previous post, the weather here has been amazing lately, so I took advantage of it by running outside. I planned a 5-mile run, so I grabbed my Spibelt, Garmin, iPhone, and headphones. For shorter runs (less than 5 miles), I only take my iPod shuffle and (sometimes) Garmin. For the longer runs, I like listening to Pandora because it has a better variety of music than my shuffle.

Even though it was pretty warm this morning, I still wanted to test out my new New York City Marathon long-sleeve tech shirt. Unfortunately, the expo ran out of my size, so my shirt is a little too big, but it’s still awesome!

I rule at the self-timer on my camera. Derp. (I know I could have easily taken a better photo, but this one crack me up!)

I ended up enjoying my run so much, I ran an extra mile. Who am I?! I’m not going to lie, that hasn’t happened in months!

Mile 1: 9:00

Mile 2: 8:46

Mile 3: 8:43

Mile 4: 8:36

Mile 5: 8:38

Mile 6: 8:19

Total: 52:02 (8:41 pace)

After my run, I headed to the gym for a 30-minute TRX class. It’s Member Appreciation Week at my gym, so I signed up for a free class. Sweet. I love free!

The class ended up being mostly an intro session, so it wasn’t super tough, but I know I’ll still be sore tomorrow. When you do TRX, you use only your body weight and suspension bands to do the exercises, so you can’t cheat!

Lunch

On the side: Lemon-Glazed Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Bananas. Mmmmm! I can’t take full credit for this recipe as it was inspired by one from the Dole Healthy Lifestyles Blogger Summit for Lime-Glazed Roasted Yams and Bananas. Honestly, the only reason for the variation is because I didn’t have lime juice or yams.

Ok, are you ready for this thing? If you love sweet potatoes and bananas, this recipe is for you! Trust me, you’ll love it!

Lemon-Glazed Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Bananas

Ingredients:

2 medium sweet potatoes, cut into 1-inch pieces (you can peel them if you want; I didn’t bother)

I’m a New Zealander, so Thanksgiving means nothing to me. I’ve pretty much taken the exact opposite pledge to this. 🙂 I have a chronic illness and some more surgery coming up in December, so I’ve got organised really early this year and have almost all of my Christmas shopping done already. Just one more gift for my mum and I’m set. At least it takes the stress off! Can’t understand people (and by “people”, I mean “almost always men”) who do their shopping on Christmas Eve!

I’m certainly going to try the lemon sweet pots and banana!
On a separate note – do you ever jog with Murphy? I know Pugs aren’t running dogs but I’m considering a Pug myself and the only problem is I’d like to be able to run with my dog.
Nicola

@Tina: Great news! That’s it – I think I’m joining the Pug owners club! yay!
I’m a Brit living in Amsterdam and so don’t celebrate Thanksgiving but even I feel like representing this year! Might do a big Turkey for my Dutch in-laws. I hate it when important holidays are shunned for the more commercial holidays. Its happens to Bonfire Night (5th November) in UK.

I don’t understand why people get in a tizzy over stores getting ready for Christmas right after Halloween…they’ve been doing it for as long as I can remember. Some people like getting ready for the holidays early. I, for one, love seeing Christmas decorations. Radio stations are already playing Christmas music and I can’t get enough of it. Thanksgiving is the gateway to Christmas; Santa is in the NYC turkey day parade for christsakes.

I also don’t get why this movement is called “respect the bird”. How is not shopping respecting the bird?

@julie: I agree with this comment. This campaign made me feel a little uneasy. Frist, “Respect the bird” implies a vegetarian Thanksgiving or maybe buying a farm-raised turkey. But really, you kinda lost me at “savor the true meaning of Thanksgiving and not begin shopping for the December holidays until after November 24th.” I mean, what IS the “true meaning of Thanksgiving”? I always feel like it’s a holiday created out of white guilt — like, “OMG look at us bonding and sharing food with the Native Americans before we wipe them off their land!” And by saying you’ll wait until after Thanksgiving to do Christmas shopping, to me, that goes against the true meaning of Christmas? I mean, I’m only into Christmas for the sparkles/presents, not the religious undertones, so I don’t CARE, but this whole campaign kinda left me scratching my head.

I worked in retail in high school and college and I’m GLAD people shopped for Christmas gifts before December! Traffic near the malls/shopping areas is bad enough in December but if everyone waited until then it would be even more crazy.

And I totally agree with others who posted about “respect the bird” sounding like a call for vegetarianism or buying humanely raised turkeys.

And really, who is FRUSTRATED about holiday sales? I don’t know why but that word just seems ridiculous. I think most people know that holiday stuff starts happening in stores in Oct/Nov — this is nothing new!

Wow more stores need to Respect the Bird! They have had CHristmas out in some stores right after Sept 1st here in NJ. I love the holidays but I like to enjoy them. Seeing Christmas/Holiday decorations out too soon makes some of the magic of the holidays go away. On a funny side note- I went to “Christmas Tree Store” the other day to find plastic spoons. When I asked the associate where these were in the store I was told “By the Christmas stuff” *sigh, I guess I asked for that one!

Many people over the past few weeks have pledged to “Respect the Bird.” While this sounds like a good notion, a little analysis proves otherwise.

The word thanksgiving is defined by Merriam Webster’s dictionary as follows:

1. the act of giving thanks
2. a prayer expressing gratitude
3. a public acknowledgement or celebration of divine goodness

How does respecting the bird fit into any of these definitions? It doesn’t.

People are complaining that retailers are not respecting the bird by placing Christmas merchandise on the shelves far too soon. Regardless of the type of merchandise in the stores, Christmas or otherwise, there is a very simple solution. Don’t purchase them. A large part of the problem is as a society we act as if we have no self-control and somehow if the items are there, we must buy them.

Others are complaining that employees are unable to spend with their families, because they have to go to work, in support of Black Friday sales. While working on any holiday may not be ideal, have we considered the sentiments of other employees, such as police officers, fire fighters, doctors, nurses, gas station attendants, convenience store clerks, bus drivers, and airline workers? The answer is a resounding “No!”

Many of these individuals spend countless hours working, and they too are spending time away from their families when most others are celebrating and relaxing. Of course, some will say that these people chose these professions, and I agree. But the same can be said of those who are complaining that they have to work to support Black Friday. It is difficult for me to believe that those in retail were not informed of the possibility of having to work odd or unusual schedules, which may include weekends and/or holidays. I wonder how someone who is unemployed would feel about working on a holiday.

So what was meant by F the Bird? It means “Forget the Bird.” In the year 1789, George Washington, First President of these United States wrote the following as he was proclaiming Thanksgiving to be a national holiday:

“Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly implore His protection and favor; and whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me to recommend to the people of the United States a day of Public Thanksgiving and Prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”

Thanksgiving is not about respecting the bird, nor is it about football or sales. Thanksgiving is a time for us to take time to be thankful for what we have, rather than complain about what we do not have.

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